Title:
What Home Services Businesses Need to Do Before Migration
If you run Local Services Ads (LSAs), the platform you use to manage them is going away.
Starting August 2026, Google will transition Local Services Ads into Google Ads as Performance Max pay-per-lead campaigns. The standalone LSA dashboard, including its lead inbox and reporting, will be retired. All management will occur within the main Google Ads platform.
For most home services businesses, daily lead generation will remain largely unchanged. However, several underlying changes could impact your account, including the potential loss of historical performance data. Here is what you need to know.
LSA Migration to Google Ads Timeline
The rollout will happen in phases, not all at once.
August 2026 kicks off the first phase for select US home and storefront services: plumbing, HVAC, electrical, appliance repair, house cleaning, lawn care, roofing, pest control, and moving.
Late 2026 expands to broader groups, including service-area businesses without a physical storefront and accounts using custom bidding or booking setups.
2027 brings in non-US accounts and every remaining category.
Google will start migrating a small group of U.S. advertisers in August 2026, with additional accounts following in phases through 2027. You will receive an email approximately 14 days before your scheduled migration date.
What stays the same
The core of what makes LSAs work isn’t changing. You’ll still pay per lead, never per click. Your ads will still show on Google Search and Google Maps. And the targeting stays keywordless, driven by your services and service area rather than a keyword list. Despite the Performance Max campaign name, these campaigns will keep the same reach as Local Services Ads.
In summary, this change affects where you manage your ads, not the product’s core functionality.
What changes, and what to do about it
There are three key actions to address before migration.
1. Your performance history will not transfer with the dashboard.
This is critical. While your lead records will transfer, your performance reports will not. After migration, the old dashboard will redirect to Google Ads, and historical reporting will be permanently unavailable. If you track cost-per-lead or seasonal trends, export all data before your migration date. This step cannot be reversed.
2. Weekly budgets will convert to daily averages.
Currently, you set a weekly budget. After migration, this amount will be divided by 7 to establish your daily average, with a monthly cap equal to your daily average multiplied by 30.4. While total spend remains similar, be aware of this change if you are accustomed to weekly budgeting.
3. Manual bidding and per-vertical Target CPA will be discontinued.
If you advertise multiple services within a single account with different Target CPA goals, this change will affect you. After migration, Google will apply a single campaign-level target across all services, which may impact performance for services requiring different bids. To address this, create separate campaigns for services with distinct targets. Many advertisers may overlook this step, so it is important to take action.
The bottom line
For many businesses, this migration will be smooth and largely seamless. You will continue to pay per lead; your ads will appear in the same locations; and Google will automatically transfer your campaign.
However, “automatic” does not mean hands-off. Export your reports before migration, review your new budget structure, and separate your verticals into individual campaigns if you use different targets. Addressing these steps will position you ahead of those who do not prepare.
If you’d rather not sort through all of this yourself, that’s the kind of thing we handle every day. Take a look at our paid search services, or get in touch and we’ll make sure your account is ready before your migration date arrives.
